


castling

by ivyrobinson



Category: Anastasia (1997), Anastasia - Flaherty/Ahrens/McNally
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23359876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivyrobinson/pseuds/ivyrobinson
Summary: When Marfa, Paulina, and Dunya place an ad looking for a new roommate, they were not expecting to end up with a cop for one.(reposted)
Relationships: Marfa/Gleb Vaganov
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	1. Chapter 1

“He’s super nice,” Dunya were the first words out of her mouth upon Marfa’s return home. During the week she had been away, in Manhattan with a client who had paid extra to have her shipped up to him from Boston. He had one of her first clients, and Marfa knew how to make a good first impression. She had heard about the latest development via the house group text, and those were also the first words Dunya had texted as well after her bombshell. “Real responsible looking. Clean. Handsome.” Her roommate winked when saying the last one.

That would be the most important detail to Dunya. She was forever getting in trouble with clients because the most handsome ones weren’t always the kindest ones, and tended to think they were above basic rules and considerations. Do not harm the girls was the second rule, coming behind do not skip out on your bill. Their Madam liked to think she had a sense of humor.

However, Marfa ignored all of that and instead focused her attention to the only other reasonable person in the room, “How did you allow this to happen?”

Paulina shrugged, and didn’t look up from the magazine she had been reading. She was apparently not as bothered by their unapproved new roommate moving in. “I was out in the Hamptons with X.”

Pauling referred to all her clients as X, Dunya liked to give them aliases, and Marfa preferred not to talk about them at all.

Not that she was ashamed but if she were a doctor she couldn’t talk about her patients, if she were a banker she couldn’t discuss member’s finances, and so she didn’t know why she should talk about the people that hired her to get them off.

“I didn’t want to cancel the interview,” Dunya said, crossing her arms and tilting her head defiantly. “I am capable of making decisions.”

“But it’s our house,” Marfa pointed out. It was a decent-ish four bedroom house in a decent-ish neighborhood. “It’s a team decision.”

Paulina snorted, “Like it was a team decision to get this house with Dmitry to begin with?” Marfa opened her mouth to protest and point out that Dmitry had been one of them. No, he wasn’t a prostitute or anything like that, but they all came from the same upbringing, grew up in the same streets, and all learned various illegal ways to survive. And then he had abandoned them all to go move in with his girlfriend. But Paulina continued on before Marfa could point out anything, “And we can’t afford to live here without Dmitry’s portion of the rent. Not for long, anyway.”

Ah, there was the rub.

“Fine,” Marfa said, deflating. “What is his name?”

“Gleb Vaganov,” Dunya answered.

“What’s he like?”

“Tall, dark, handsome,” she responded, dreamily. And then at Marfa’s one raised eyebrow, “Responsible looking.”

These were disturbingly vague descriptors.

“Job?” Marfa asked, and both of her roommates shrugged. “References? Background checks?”

“That’s against the code,” Dunya exclaimed, “Why do what we wouldn’t others to do to us?”

Well, that’s why they had gotten a place to live together. Also, there was some basic protections they needed to take.

And Marfa loved Dunya, she truly did. She wouldn’t be where she was without her friend. That did not keep her from wanting to strangle her a good portion of the time, however.

“It’ll be fine,” Paulina said, leaning over and patting Marfa on the shoulder. “We don’t work out of here, and we’re hardly ever home anyway.”

She knew that, logically, however she was having trouble of letting go how well everything used to work.

The doorbell rang, and then it was too late for her to lodge any more complaints, unless she wanted to evict their new roommate on the spot. Marfa stood up, pulled open the door and saw the most well chiseled face she had ever come across. She had to gulp down a gasp, as though she was a preteen coming across a teen idol for the first time. Marfa saw men all the time, so she averted her gaze and that’s when she saw it.

A police uniform. So not their roommate. Maybe a stripper. She knew the uniform itself was too nice and pristine to be a stripper but the alternative had her heart in her throat, but she looked back up and forced up a smile.

“Evening Officer,” She said, “Can I help you?”

He rubbed at the stubble on his face almost sheepishly. As far as intimidation tactics, if he was here on suspicion of anything, it wasn’t a good one. Unless his attractiveness was the intimidation tactic. “I’m actually here to move in.”

And that’s when Marfa saw it. The luggage. She was going to be arrested in the next twenty minutes, and it wasn’t going to be for solicitation as she always assumed, but rather for murdering Dunya.

“Oh,” she breathed, but this was more difficult to recover from. “You’re a police officer.” She turned her head to direct the last two words to Dunya, who had the decency to slump down in her seat and cover her face with her hands.

“Sorry, my shift just finished, and I couldn’t really get to my clothes to change,” Gleb told her, peering behind her. Oh right, she should step aside and let the police officer come in so he could come live with her and her friends who had also been illegally making money off of sex since they were teenagers.

“Right,” she said, then sighed and stepped aside to let him in.

-

It was probably crazy, to move into a house full of strangers, women at that, but Gleb Vaganov was unfortunately desperate at the moment. The original apartment he had secured when he first got the news he was being transferred to Boston had fallen through the day before he moved. The day he moved, he had spent on the couch of his new partner’s living room, and spent the next day going from one shady looking apartment and rooms to the next. The last place he had come to was this house, looking for a fourth roommate. Three women. Only one of them was home.

The living room was clean, the empty bedroom was more spacious than the entire space of the last apartment he had looked at, and the girl- Dunya- who had interviewed him had been wide eyed and friendly. There were probably a lot of signs this was not a good idea, but the biggest one had been how easily she had offered him the room. No references, no credit check, no talking to her other roommates- who had been, somewhat suspiciously, out of town on business.

But then he had gone back to the couch and was almost run over by his partner’s young children and he had immediately called Dunya and agreed to move in at the beginning of the following week.

And now he was here and he had never felt more awkward.

The girl who had answered the door- Not Dunya, as he currently knew her (or also, either Paulina or Marfa), wasn’t making it easier. He wondered if Dunya had informed them of his taking the room.

He should probably confirm, “You knew I was coming...right?”

The girl blinked, and moved a little more so he could walk in. “Yes. Dunya told us.”

Dunya, strangely, was curled up in a ball on the couch, but she lifted her head up in a reluctant sort of way, when her name was said. The third girl, who was also on the couch, and regarding him warily, reached over and shoved Dunya off the couch. She stumbled, but straightened. “Gleb! Hi.” She reached over and shook his hand, every inch the girl he had met the week before. He relaxed slightly. “This is Paulina,” girl three on the couch, “And Marfa.” Girl two who had answered the door.

Paulina reached down and picked up one of his suitcases, “Here, let us help you with this.” She turned around, “Marushka, please.”

Marfa bent down and picked up one of his bags, and then looked behind her back at him, “Follow me.”

He did. He had a feeling that it’s not something she had to ask for very often, but rather something people just did, instinctively.

Gleb had always prided himself on being immune to pretty woman. He may, however, not have been exposed to pretty women as he had thought he had been before. But she was a roommate, and there was already a weird tension in the air. He was immune.

Paulina threw open the door to the room, “We don’t have a lot of rules, but try to keep it in relatively the same shape it’s in now.” She pointed up the stairs, “My room is up the stairs to the left, Dun’s is up and to the right, and the kitchen is left of the main door and you saw the living room.” She dropped his luggage in the middle of the floor, stopped to exchange some sort of non verbal communication with Marfa, and then disappeared up the stairs.

“And you?” He asked Marfa.

She had been watching Paulina disappear, but her green eyes were back on him. She gestured to the room across the hall, “I’m over there. I come and go at odd hours, but I guess you will too.”

The uniform made people nervous, he knew. And also a stranger moving into a new living situation. That had to account for the vibe he was getting from all three of them. “What do you do?”

“Bartend mostly,” she said.

Gleb frowned, “I thought you were away last week on business.”

Marfa almost seemed to frown as well, but then smirked, “We call them swag conventions. You want a Jager hat?”

“I’ll pass,” Gleb said, and she started to turn as though she were leaving. “Do people really like that? Random stuff with alcohol names on it.”

“Dude, it’s Boston,” she said with a laugh, “But in general, nothing makes a frat boy feel cooler than a shirt with a beer bottle on it.”

A weird lingering moment, and she seemed to be about to leave again.

“I hope you card.” Then he winced, what was he even saying?

She saluted him, “Aye, aye Officer.”

Then she slipped out the door and ran up the stairs before he could make any other awkward attempts at conversation. He could faintly hear her call out Dunya’s name and then a door slammed.

Gleb’s first few weeks in this new city had already been some of the weirdest of his life.


	2. Chapter 2

Despite Marfa’s better instincts, Dunya was still alive. The joy of seeing Paulina actually come alive with upset helped Marfa’s own temper go down a notch, as it wasn’t just her that thought living with a cop was a bad fucking idea. However, it was also Paulina that pointed out that right now they didn’t do anything suspicious. Suddenly evicting a cop from their home for no good reason would be suspicious.

Marfa thought it would be practical, but she was outvoted and it was thrown in her face she had just pointed out that they made decisions as a team. (When it was convenient.)

It worked out that they both worked such odd hours, so avoiding him had been easy and not as obvious. It was fine, all four of them lived their own separate lives.

And here she was, living her lie. Tending bar, while the same ten alternative songs that people actually remembered from the 90s played. The Nevsky Prospect Bar was a bit higher class bar, attracting a lot of traveling business men, who wouldn’t waste their time or money in a dive. If they were lucky, and knew the right people, then they’d know how to order something off the menu and end up in a room upstairs. It wasn’t required to work there, though it was expected- eventually. Bartending tips were great but eventually you wanted to know how to make the real money. Every girl either left before she knew it was really an option or took up the opportunity. And you never had to be available for anyone you didn’t want to be.

Which was for the best, because Marfa didn’t think she could accomplish much beyond slinging drinks. Her mind was occupied and it was throwing her off her flirting game. She even wore her drabbest wig, this light brown color she had pulled back into a ponytail. Marfa loved wearing wigs. It helped avoid any awkward run ins if anyone ran into her when she was just being herself, and it really allowed her to become a new person whenever she wanted.

A new customer sat down in front of her, pulling her out of thinking about her current dilemma. She started pouring a drink, but didn’t look up, “I haven’t forgiven you.”

“Of course not,” Dmitry responded, his tone fond and not serious, “No one can hold a grudge like Marfa Spektor, I’d expect nothing less from you.”

She tipped the glass of Sam Adams she had and poured some on his lap, but he didn’t (and wouldn’t) give her the satisfaction of jumping up.

All he did, was talk the now half empty glass and take a sip from it, “Too much temper, you gotta hold back a little.”

She narrowed her eyes at him, “Do you want to know what your friend, Dunya, did?”

“Was it worse than pouring warm, foamy beer on a lap?” He asked.

Marfa ignored him, “She found us a new roommate.”

Dmitry had the common sense to look confused by that, “You guys left her in charge of that?”

“No,” she ground out. “She took it upon herself when Polly and I were out of town.”

He shook his head, and then paused to check his phone before slipping it back in his pocket. “I take it you’re not fond of your new roommate?”

“He’s a cop.”

Now Dmitry had the very common sense to look thoroughly confused, “A cop?” Then he moved his glass away from the counter before laughing. “Like a legit cop?” She nodded and he laughed some more, “Why?”

“Because she didn’t ask any questions,” Marfa explained, holding eye contact with him. “Because someone taught her about a code where you don’t pry into other people’s private business.”

Dmitry’s mouth formed an ‘o’ shape, and he slowly stood up, “Well, that’s unfortunate. I’m sure whoever did that couldn’t foresee that no one would be around to help properly interview potential roommates.”

She waved him off, and noticed the guy at the end eyeing her while talking to the shift manager. Marfa gave a signal for no to her. “Leave, go back to Anya, I can’t stand the sight of you anymore.”

“So dramatic,” he said, but he was glancing over at that guy now too. “Are you going to be okay here?”

“Yes, as much of a stretch as it sounds, grown men can handle being rejected by me,” She rolled her eyes, “Now leave, you’re annoying now you’re in love and have a conscience.”

Dmitry shook his head, and used some napkins to help try to dry off his lap. It didn’t work and she almost felt bad for him. “Don’t forget my phone number- just in case you need it for your one phone call.”

He may have been one of her oldest friends, but he was lucky he was getting out of there with only a spilled drink on his lap.

-

Living with three strangers- three women- had not turned out as odd as Gleb had been expecting. Between all of their hours, their paths did not cross as much as he had expected. Dunya was the one around the most, and she tended to follow Gleb around and prattle on. She seemed to like to date around a lot and never seemed to stay with the same guy for very long. Paulina, he was fairly certain, was having an affair with a married man. She was very mysterious about it, but in that young and obvious way. She wouldn’t say his name, and there were several other indicators that this relationship was held under the cloak of secrecy in general. And Marfa...well, Marfa was the only he saw and talked to the least. He heard her sometimes though, when she’d slip out for the night, or he could hear her moving around her room across the hall as she got ready for sleep. He saw glimpses of her occasionally. Fidgeting with a short skirt before leaving for the bar for the night. In the morning, her hair up high in a ponytail, wearing tiny running shorts, and sweaty as she slipped into her bedroom and ran a shower.

No he couldn’t figure out anything about Marfa at all.

So it somewhat startled him, as he was arranging a snack in the middle of the night, when she slipped into the kitchen, the smell of alcohol clinging to her clothes, her skirt partially unzipped, and her shirt creeping up her midriff. She seemed equally startled to see him.

A pin fell out of her mouth, when she spotted him. “Gleb?” It seemed to fall somewhere as a statement and a question, before she shook her head, and pulled another pin out from her hair. A springy curl falling into place. “Sorry, I didn’t think you knew how to dress like a regular human.”

He looked down at the pajama shorts he was wearing, and a Boston PD t-shirt. He supposed she probably had only seen him in full uniform and in his suit and tie he wore. “I thought I’d see what all the fuss was about.”

Her mouth cracked a smile then, and she continued on to open the fridge. She never stood still around him. Maybe it wasn’t just him, as he couldn’t observe her when he wasn’t around. “Your conclusion?”

“Comfortable, but not for daylight hours,” he responded.

Marfa poured half a glass of milk, before putting the carton away. “Funny. That’s how i feel about my work clothes.”

The comment made him look back down at what she was wearing. The strip of skin between her shirt and skirt, and the glimpse of lace where the zipper on the side of her skirt had been pulled down. She was reaching up again, pulling the pins from her hair, causing her skirt to ride up to where it could no longer really be classified as a skirt.

“You look so disapproving, Officer,” she murmured, and his eyes shot back up to look at hers.

That...had not been where his thoughts had been going. But it was better if they kept it to this belief.

Gleb stood up, putting his hand on her shoulder, and applied soft pressure to it, “Sit, Marfa.”

She held his gaze for a beat. And then another. But then she sat. “I didn’t realize you could be so authoritative, Vaganov.”

He got to work pulling the pins from her hair and setting them on the table. Her hair fell to her shoulder in soft ringlets as he did so. Gleb couldn’t recall ever seeing her with her hair down. “Let’s hope you never have cause to see me in my natural habitat.”

Marfa chewed her lip thoughtfully at that, and then caught his gaze again. It gave him a flash of her, at his desk, handcuffs, and her pleading for clemency. He shook the image away quickly. He was immune to beautiful women. There had been women before, in his custody that had tried similar things but he had never been tempted. Nor had he ever imagined it before it happened. He pulled the last pin from her hair a little more forcefully than he meant to. Marfa sucked in a breath, but didn’t cry out or complain.

“Sorry,” he said, stepping away from her. “I’m unfamiliar with women’s hair...stuff like this.”

She ran her fingers through her curls, and then took the milk and gulped it down in one take. “You were quicker than I would’ve been.”

“I should sleep,” Gleb announced. “So should you.”

“You’re bossy tonight,” Marfa teased, but she headed towards her room. “Good night, Officer.”

“Good night,” he called back, but her door was already closed.

Gleb looked around the kitchen, but couldn’t quite remember what he had come out for. He moved Marfa’s glass to the sink and headed back to his bedroom. He suddenly felt tightly strung and restless, and he couldn’t quite pinpoint why.


	3. Chapter 3

It fell into a routine. Somehow Gleb and Marfa’s schedules fell into place, where they would cross paths in the early hours of the morning. She’d kick off her heels, slide into her room, and shed out of her bar/brothel clothes and into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. She’d tip toe out into the kitchen and he’d be out there already, in his shorts and t-shirt as well. A cup of lemon tea already waiting. It wasn’t planned or spoken, so it was like slipping into another world, another life, as she sat cross legged on a chair as he pulled pin after pin out of her hair. She’d stare at the words across the chest of his t-shirt, the Boston Police Department the only thing anchoring her to reality.

They didn’t always talk- at least not much. Instead he’d bite down in his lower lip in concentration as he plucked a pin out, and then his fingers would work it’s way down the loose tendril, unraveling the curl.

She liked to think it was the tea that centered her, bringing her some sort of strange peace after a night of noise, and strange hands pressed against her. It’s what she ran in the morning for, a way to reset herself, but some morning she found herself sleeping in now. She thought she felt centered, but some nights, as his hands worked the curls out of her hair, and the tip of his tongue stuck out between his teeth and his lower lip, she felt positively electric.

“Do you ever look like yourself at work?” He asked, and she wondered if it was strange to disguise yourself as a bartender.

“No,” she said, her eyes momentarily flitting up from the lettering on his shirt to meet his eyes, “This-” she motioned to her undone hair and unmade up face, “Is friends and family only.”

Gleb paused, his palm pressed against her scalp, “I’m honored to be included.”

Marfa looked away and tried to calm down her anger against Dunya.

Sometimes she put in more pins than she actually needed, but she swore it wasn’t intentional.

“Do you...have a boyfriend?” He asked, one night when she had come home a little later than usual.

“No,” her eyes were focused on the Police Department written in block letters of his shirt. She took a sip of her tea and thought of the man she had been with earlier that night. Mid forties. Expensive cologne. A mark on his finger where a ring would be. He had said she looked like his daughter’s best friend, the loud obnoxious one he could always hear through the walls when she slept over. Marfa had spent a good part of his hour, sitting on his lap, giggling, pouting and calling him Mr. Klavensky, before he had rolled them over, and panted a name that was not hers in her ear like a mantra. His hand had stroked her skin like a reverence, and he had tipped her an extra $50 when he had left. “It’s not really my thing.”

He was quiet after that, so then she had asked, “You?”

“No,” Gleb answered, and he was looking down at her but she couldn’t bring herself to look up. “Boyfriends aren’t really my thing either.”

“Ah, there’s that famous Vaganov sense of humor.”

He smiled, and it transformed his face, as it always did. In the brief flash of a smile, he looked younger, more free, as much of a boy in another life as she felt like a girl in another one during these exchanges.

As many things as Marfa could (pretend to) be in this lifetime, she could have been so much more in others. It had never bothered her until recently.

“Ah yes. The two things a Vaganov is known best for- our ability to be on time and our sense of humor.”

At least Gleb had a sense of humor about his lack of a sense of humor.

She pressed the tip of her fingernail against the word Police on his shirt, “Not for being an excellent shot?”

He responded to that with a sheepish smile, and leaned in to whisper in her ear, as he pulled the final pin out of her hair, “I must confess- I am actually a terrible shot.”

Marfa laughed- no, she giggled, and then covered up her mouth because who was she even? “Good night, Gleb.”

Gleb stepped back to allow her to slide off the stool. She tilted her head up, to say thank you and goodnight, but there was a weird pause, and they both stumbled, jerking back.Instead, she just flashed him a quick smile, and then disappeared into her room.

She had to right or reason to have this stupid, giddy feelings after these brief twilight exchanges.

So then, of course, Dmitry’s Anya had to go and ruin it all.

-

There was a sharp knock on the door, sometime in the early afternoon on Saturday. Marfa considered it to be more her breakfast-ish time. She had been out late again, an out of town businesswoman, who had asked for her appointment an hour after the bar usually closed up, and Marfa had gone with it. Business people were always either people who wanted to be dominated after a long day or week of having to make decisions and micromanaging their staff, or there were people who continued to need power and micromanage everything even outside of the office. Jacqueline, call me Jaq, had definitely been the latter.

She was hoping for a re-set on her brain, but when Gleb had walked in with boxes of take out, she saw she’d need to try something else. Or something more. If there was nothing Marfa ever forgot it was where she came from and who she was.

“I can get that,” Gleb offered, moving his chair back.

Marfa got up faster, “I got it.”

There was only one person that knocked so sharply and heavily, despite the fact they were the smallest and daintiest person Marfa had ever met. Subtlety had never been Anya’s strong suit.

She pulled open the door, to see Anya standing there, holding a rather large box.

Anya looked Marfa up and down, “I see you’re not in handcuffs yet.”

Marfa reached over and stroked Anya’s cheek, “That’ll cost extra if you’re looking for something later.”

“I regret coming over here already,” Anya said, with a sigh.

“DId we invite you?” Marfa asked, but she stepped aside to let the girl in.

Anya had come into their lives during one of Dmitry’s schemes, which turned into a fucking hallmark romance movie for them. Robbing her of her roommate and best friend, and adding Anya to their lives. Neither girl had fully recovered. Dmitry continued on his life as normal, as unbothered as ever.

Anya seemed to be counting in her head, before stepping in. “So we did a clean out of the closet today, and Dmitry...and I… thought you guys might want some of the costumes we no longer have a use for.”

Anya worked as an assistant for a costume designer. Which had been unfortunately, and fortunately, helpful especially when it came to wigs and accessories.

Marfa managed to mumble out a thank you. But Anya’s attention was already drawn over to something behind Marfa.

“Oh, is this the new roommate?” Anya said, depositing the (heavy) box into Marfa’s arms.

Marfa dropped the box on the floor, as Gleb stepped forward, extending his hand, which Anya shook.

“Hi, I’m Gleb Vaganov, a pleasure to meet you….?”

“Anya,” Marfa responded, as it was probably the polite thing to do.

“Anya,” Gleb repeated in a soft tone Marfa had never heard before, and was staring at Anya as though she had a golden halo around her. Which, was not unlike the way Dmitry also looked at Anya.

“A pleasure to meet you as well,” Anya said, releasing his hand. “Officer, right?”

Marfa rolled her eyes, and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Yes,” Gleb said, smiling. “How do you know Marfa?”

“We know each other through friends of friends,” Marfa inserted. Anya wouldn’t out them, but the two of them would never pass up a chance to needle the other.

Anya looked between the two of them, as though she was thinking about something. “If you guys don’t want something in there, just let me know and I can bring them to a shelter.” She addressed Gleb. “It was nice to meet you, Gleb. Hopefully I’ll see you around soon.”

Gleb moved to open the door for Anya, so she could leave. “Feel free to stop by anytime- I’m here every day!”

Then he closed the door behind her, and Marfa turned around and went into her bedroom to fall back asleep. Gleb showing interest in other girls, even unattainable ones like Anya, was good news. Whatever weird chemistry and moments they kept having could not continue to happen.

That was for certain.


End file.
